Lady Bears look to score upset against Central

Published 4:55 pm, Thursday, February 17, 2011

After winning its playoff opener in its first postseason appearance in nearly a decade, Montgomery is hoping to add another playoff victory to its résumé.

The Lady Bears held on — despite a late 11-0 run by Kingwood Park — to come out on top 51-48 in their Region III-4A bi-district match on Tuesday night.

Now, No. 19 state-ranked Montgomery (26-7) will face off against No. 6 Beaumont Central in the area playoffs tonight at 6:30 at the Aldine ISD M.O. Campbell Center.

The Lady Bears had to defend two Kingwood Park possessions in the game’s final seconds with a three-point lead.

“The first three quarters we played tremendously well,” Montgomery coach Alicia Jordan said. “There wasn’t any evidence of nerves, which is huge because none of these girls have played in a playoff game and because every team in the playoffs in this area is good. In the fourth quarter, the kids’ inexperience started to show a bit, but they hung on. That they were able to hang on for the win speaks volumes about who we are. The heart of this team is just tremendous.”

Montgomery now will face a different beast when it meets up with one of the state’s top teams in the Lady Jaguars.

“Central is highly athletic,” Jordan said. “In our games we’ve always been the more athletic team, but that won’t be the case (tonight). But they don’t have one or two really talented girls that carry the team, they’re really talented across the board. We understand their team, though, and know what we have to do against them. We’ve got to play nearly perfect basketball, and we have got to minimize our turnovers on the offensive end. And on defense we have to make some tempo adjustments. We’ll have to play at a high level the whole time to keep up with them.”

If Montgomery is able to defy the odds and score the upset over Central, it’d move on to face the winner of Huntsville and Dayton.

“This will probably be our toughest game all year — just like a second-round game should be,” Jordan said. “We know what we’re facing, though, and what we’ve got to do. We have to go out there and fight as hard as we can and hopefully it’s a good game.

“We’re going to have to play our best game of the entire year if we’re to win. We’ve got to minimize turnovers and take care of the ball. We also need some other things to go our way. Hopefully, there will be a good officiating crew and we hope we can get a good crowd down there for the game. I think, considering we’re a huge underdog in this game, no one expects much from us — but not our team. We know what we’re about and we’re going to go out there and show everyone in the big arena.”